Last reports from 2011.

So it is time to finish all reports from last year.

LLew

When I came back from all seminars and before WC at my place came Croatia Sheepdog who is staying at my place for 7 months.

His name is Llew and he is living and training at my place and waiting to go to Japan. He can't go earlier because of all rabies tests. His owners decided that I will train him asked me and I said yes.This is a first dog that I took for such a long time to be at my place.Llew is mentally strong dog, willing to work, not nervous like some CS are.He has a lot of potential to be a good pet and good agility dog. Training with him is not a problem and just hope that his owners will continue to work with him like I am doing it.

World Championship in France

It was time to start training with Tip for World Championship in France and prepare us for good runs. We came in France after a long and exhausting trip. I have nothing to say much about WC just that I was disappointed with artificial grass. It was no fun to watch all best dogs slipping on every course. From four runs Tip and I had one good. We started with Jumping Individual and beginning of the course was really good but after few obstacles Tip slipped and missed one jump. It was no fun to take him back it’s WC and one mistake or disq for me is the same.Next run was Jumping Team and he was running really nice. Two other courses were disaster because he was slipping a lot and my concentration was not there anymore. When I saw that he is knocking the bars and usually he is not doing it I just stopped. But it was a good experience for me and him. I saw that we have to train also on some bad artificial grass if we want to have good results on WC :). Except experience from France I came back home with one more dog. My dear friends from Japan, Atsuko and Takumi Nagata, decided to mate their bitch with Tip, so they brought her from Japan to France.

Ruka

Her name is Ruka and first time I saw her was when I had seminar in Japan at their place and I was really amazed with her. Ruka is like Atsuko said “strong and friendly dog”. It’s really hard to amaze me but she did it; her character, will for work, explosiveness all that and more. She is one of the fastest dog I ever saw. She is staying at my place until 16th of January when we are going together to Japan. It was a little bit stressful to wait if she will be in heat or not before I will go to Japan. We didn’t know exactly when she will be in heat. But she started and finish her heat just in right time and after successful mating she is ready to go back home. After having five dogs in the same time I just confirm my attitude that I will not have a lot of dogs in the same time. They were all good but it’s just not enough time to have really good relationship as I want to have with my dogs.

Next step to do is seminar in Japan in January.

Summer report

Summer started here with a lot of sun and heat. Luckily I had a lot of seminars in Scandinavia so it wasn't hard to survive the summer. In June I went to France where I had seminars. My friend Danijel went with me so it was much easier to travel 1400 km and, to be honest, he was driving all the way there and back. It was my first official seminar in France organized by Christine Charpentier and I really enjoyed it.

In July Tip and I went to Sweden to Jenny Damm’s place for seminars together with her.It was organized as summer camp second year in a row. First seminar was few days before Border collie classic and lasted for two days. After seminar we went to Denmark to compete on BCC and there was lot of rain but also some good results in JUMPING. Although Tip and I qualified for the final after our first run, the final didn't bring us a lot of luck; rain, slippery dog walk and last jump down - but in the end I was satisfied. After that it was time to go back to Sweden to hold more seminars. These were also two-day seminars with lovely weather, nice people and food.The same day we finished seminars, we packed our bags and started another trip to EO in Austria.It was a long trip but we had luck renting a cabin on ferry sleeping a little bit. We came there in the middle of the night. My friends from club put my tent up (thank you for that guys) so it was great just to come, unpack the things and go to sleep.Weather was just „great“ like last year – a LOT of rain and mud. After the first day we didn't qualify for the finals individually but it was another day and a chance to qualify in the team final and in the end we did that.When I say team, I mean: Nina Gregl & Australian kelpie Will, Buga Miksic & Malinois Jupe, Alen Marekovic & Border collie Myf and me and Tip.Course was really interesting and when we walked it - it looked really difficult.It was like relay race. Buga started first (clear), then Alen (clear), me (clear), Nina (two mistakes) and in the end it was enough to win the third place on EO.Thank you team!!!!!!!!!!!After ceremony we went for dinner and back home. It was a really long and exhausting night with a great ending.

After three weeks of being home it was time to go to Finland. Again only Tip and I. He was lucky this year to go with me without Malinois and he liked it. First few days I stayed at Mia Laamanen's place. The first two days we were just enjoying ourselves; herding with Tip and sauna for me. My time in Finland started great! I stayed in Finland for two weeks, living little bit at Mia's place, little bit at Saija's Mustonen place. It was a lot of seminars and private classes but with that kind of people and dogs it was no problem to work the whole day with. Last weekend there I was judging a two-day competition.

Monday was the last day seminar day and time to go to Norway. Monday evening I had a plane to Norway and came to Jenni Lehtinen and Jan Egil Eide place.There first day we had rain but days after were sunny and warm. It’s a great thing that they have a field and obstacles in the garden so it was easy to change and do everything.There were nice people and dogs I saw for the first time, open minded and willing to try something you advise them.With seminars I finished on Thursday and on Friday it was time to go back home to see my Malinois; Djurdja and Gunga.

Now it's time to train for World Championship in France.

See you there!!!!!!!

Seminars Denmark and Finland

After a long time here is some news again. I was a bit lazy but now here it is :o).

14th of April Tip, Gunga and I went to Finland by plane. Of course on the Zagreb airport we had some problems but we arrived safely in Helsinki and then to Nummela.I started with seminars 15th and I hold them until 26th of April. It was really a pleasure to hold seminars there again and to see some people I met before to see how they improved from last time I’ve been there. Of course I met new people and dogs who were really good and trying their best. It’s really nice to have seminars there because people are really into agility. During my stay in Finland I had opportunity to see Tip’s puppies and Gunga’s brothers and sisters (Saija and Riina thank you for that).I was really satisfied with Tip’s puppies; they all looked really nice and capable for that age. I liked character and will they have to work with their owners.

Gunga had meeting with her family and they had a nice time.

It was not only work there, we had time for competing as well. Tip and I had great results. We were competing on four competitions (11 courses); 4 time 1st place, 2 times 2nd place and some mistakes and disqualifications. It was great opportunity to train and compete on different surface especially for Tip who is really young and needs that. We don’t have so many competitions on artificial grass so this was a great chance. I was also competing with Yava (tervueren owned by Nina Frantsi) and we had one 2nd place, one 16th place and in one course mistake. He was really good, we trained only once for 5 minutes. Thank you Nina ;o)

When everything was finished, last day of my staying there was for trying some new things. I went to real wooden Finish sauna and after that in frozen lake; typical Finnish but for me a big challenge (Tiiu thank you for that great experience).

After we finished everything in Finland we went to Denmark. It was mien first time to hold seminar there. I had two days seminar and it was perfect thanks to Winni who organize everything perfectly.Every morning she made bread (waking up at 5 a.m.), lunch and dinner.Most of the people I saw there it was first time to see them but no problem to get out everything from them to be better in handling.I really enjoyed my stay there.

I had 16 great days in Scandinavia. Thank you everybody for that.We went back to Zagreb 30th of April.

I am looking forward to go back there.

Successful Sunday, 3rd of April 2011

Tip won agility and jumping on 2nd Croatian championship

Seminar in Japan

From January 20th till January 23rd I held a seminar in Japan at Nagata dog school. It was a long trip but it was so worth it. Started on the 18th in Zagreb, later that day I met with Jenny Damm in Paris and after 5 hours waiting for our flight we flew for 13 hours to Tokyo arriving January 19th.

At the airport we were welcomed by Atsuko and Takumi Nagata and Katsumi Immamura and we went to their home to leave our luggage and settle down. After lunch we had the first practice with the hosts and their friends. Welcome Dinner was an appropriate opportunity to begin experiencing Japanese cuisine. There wasn't many „cultural shocks“ that night, that we've later seen during our stay.

On Thursday morning we went to a seminar with the same goal and enthusiasm as we continue through Sunday evening because there were a lot of good dogs and handlers and the seminar went fast and fun. During my stay in Japan my picture of the Japanese people changed because I always thought they were shy, but after just a few minutes of work and getting to know each other, the atmosphere was completely opposite. On Thursday evening we started exploring real Japanese cuisine, and one of the first new things I tried was Shabu-shabu (しゃぶしゃぶ, also spelledsyabu-syabu?), it is a Japanese version of hot pot. The dish is related to sukiyaki in style, in that both use thinly sliced meat and vegetables and are usually served with dipping sauces, but it is considered to be more savory and less sweet than sukiyaki. It is considered a winter dish but is eaten year-round.

On Friday, the cultural shocks continued but all very positive cultural shocks. In the restaurant, in the centerpiece of the table is a grill where you prepare your own food so you're able to adjust the strength of the flames, my food was well done of course.

Saturday was the day for sushi and I must admit that some of it I didn't like so much, but it's important to try new things.After four days of seminars, followed a sightseeing day around Tokyo.Too little, but enough to gain an impression of size and bustle of the city. Millions of people that constantly circulate through the city, lots of shops and a continuous crowd don't appear so at all because they all follow rules to keep the city functioning smoothly.